Thursday, December 01, 2005

Chagrin

Yesterday on my way out to lunch, I was waiting for the elevator and struck up a conversation with one of the legal secretaries at the firm. He is something of a techie and has, apparently, invented some potentially valuable technological innovation that he is in the process of shopping to telecommunications companies. He's explained it all to me on more than one occasion, but for the life of me, I couldn't tell you what exactly his product does. Something to do with music. I think.

Anyway, so he starts complaining about the difficulties he is having coordinating meetings with investors, and getting other members from his "team" to show up on time and what not. I nodded a knowing and commiserating nod - even threw in the furrowed brow of concern for good measure. What the hell, I was feeling magnanimous.

"Must be tough," I said.

"Well, it wouldn't be if I could get a spare minute around here," he responded.

I admit to being somewhat taken aback by this statement, considering that he was in essence complaining to one of his bosses about the fact that his current job (with us) was not allowing him enough time to work on his side project. While at work. All I could do was nod lamely. But he went on.

"I need a new job," he said with surprising candor and determination.

"Yeah, one with more on-the-job free time," I responded with more than a slight bite of sarcasm - or so I thought.

Unfazed, he agreed emphatically, "Yeah!" Then, completed the scene, "And with triple the salary."

If I was drinking something, I probably would have spit it out in shock. Oh well.



<< Home

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?